The train ride to the client's house was slow, boring, and completely frosty. It consisted of Laxus ignoring all my questions on what needed to be done for the mission. Master hadn't told me anything. Once we were off the train we proceeded to go to the client's house. I'd given up on getting answers at that point.
As we walked up the short path up to the door I could feel Laxus tense next to me. I immediately tried to find the source of his tension. I didn't find it until we were on the porch: the door was ajar. Glancing at Laxus I saw his jaw clench and I tentatively pushed open the door.
The house was in ruins. Papers and bits of what used to be a beautiful vase were scattered everywhere. The remains of a half-finished breakfast could be seen on the table through the hole in the wall. A small coffee table was over turned and had a missing leg. None of this phased Laxus as he barged passed me to search the house.
I on the other hand barely registered any of this; it passed through my head. The image in front of me stuck in my head. It consumed all of my attention. Memories flashed behind my eyes and I sunk deeper into shock. I dropped to my knees and clutched my necklace. In front of me painted in blood, just like it used to be, was a triangle behind a crossed sword and ax inscribed in a circle.
Footsteps drew near and I leapt into action. Blind to the world I followed my instinct. With a crash I landed on top of a masculine figure and held a hand sheathed in swirling winds to the person's neck.
Laxus
I didn't find anyone still in the house. The signs of struggle were clear and centered around the foyer and kitchen. I walked back through the kitchen and a flash of red made me stop. It wasn't blood, though, and my eyebrows furrowed in confusion. It was a torn piece of cloth: a black hawk on a red field. This was not good. As I stood staring at the scrap of cloth I thought back to yesterday.
"What do you want Gramps?" I barked as I slouched in a chair in the old man's office.
He leveled a glare at me and said, "The mission I'm sending you and Aiyana on is strictly recon. The magic council has recently heard rumors of a dark guild growing in power."
"So? What's that got to do with us? Dark guild rise and fall all the time." I responded.
"Laxus," Gramps warned.
"It's true though! The Magic Council did nothing about Grimoire Heart, why would they worry about this one?" I retorted. Gramps sighed and leaned back in his chair.
"There have been rumors of them trying to bring back The Arena," he paused, "Do you understand the seriousness of this Laxus?" I stopped to let his words really sink in. That was the thing that had terrorized mages during the Dragon Civil War. How could something so long ago have an impact now?
"They're targeting civilians Laxus. This isn't what Aiyana faced back then, it' worse," Gramps said, "They have also taken their pens to the idea of The Arena and changed somethings. There are horrible consciences for those that try to interfere. I have decided that this needs to be dealt with before it gets any bigger. I have a contact that you are to get information from and then report directly back to me."
It looked like the poor sucker had been found out and taken out. I started to walk back to the front door to find Aiyana. The cover for this mission was to go clear out a cave full of monsters, I could still play that by Aiyana and get away with it. Maybe she would buy the whole he stole something from the cave and got attacked and that's why he put up the mission request. Yeah that sounded convincing.
I turned the corner to see Aiyana on her knees staring at the wall. What the Hell? I thought as I took another step towards her. Her eyes flashed and this time I spoke out loud, "What the Hell?!" as my back hit the ground. My eyes widened when I felt the wind rushing around my neck. She had me straddled and was holding her hand up to my neck.
"Tiny Tits?" I probed. Her gaze was blank and she seemed to be waiting for something. Her body was tense and her head was cocked to the side as if she were listening to something.
"Aiyana," I spoke harsher, "What are you doing?" She snapped out of it at her name. She looked at me in confusion.
"Laxus?" she whispered glancing around us, "I-I. There's the mark of The Arena on the wall. A-and I," she gulped and looked like what, embarrassed?! Well this was a first.
"And you what?" I asked.
"I remembered the time I spent in The Arena," she stumbled through her words, "Whoever the client was is dead," she finished in monotone, her face becoming blank. Crap I thought, how the Hell am I supposed to convince her in was nothing now? I had to act fast.
"Aiyana, he's not dead! Look," I pointed to the crude drawing, "It doesn't have the triangle your necklace has. It can't be them, so he's not dead. Let's go report this to the Rune Knights and then look for him in the cave he wanted us to clear out."
Aiyana
I started at the symbol on the wall. I blinked and looked closer to see that it did indeed not have the triangle. The sword was wrong too, this one was a cutlass and the real one was a broad sward. I glanced back and forth between the Laxus and the symbol. I decided to go with it instead of get into argument; and later I would express my concerns to Master.
"Maybe you're right," I said willing my voice to stay strong. I shifted my weight back and removed my hand from his neck. A chuckle rumbled through his chest and my eyes snapped open. I was sitting on top of Laxus! I scrambled off of him none too gracefully and his chuckle turned into full on laughter.
"That's not funny Laxus!" I yelled. All of the fear evaporated out of my body just like that. I smiled and stood up. He stayed on the floor looking at me and I suddenly felt rather bold. I struck a pose: my weight rested on my left leg and I popped out my right knee. With one hand on my hip and the other scrunched in my hair I said, "Take a picture. It'll last longer." To seal the deal I winked at him.
I could now say that I had made Laxus Dreyer speechless. He stared at me with wide eyes. After a moment of silence, my eye twitched and I said, "No really Laxus, invest in a camera. 'Cause I am not doing this again," I stood normally and continued, "So who are these Rune Knights exactly?"
I could swear he was blushing when he coughed and heaved himself up. "They're the enforcers of the Magic Counsel's laws. They are also the ones we report things like this to," He explained as he walked out the door. I took special notice to how he kept his back to me the entire time. Before I walked out the door, I glanced back at the symbol one last time. It sent shivers down my spine. Laxus might have said that it wasn't The Arena, but I still had my doubts. Before they would leave their mark on the walls of those they had kidnapped.
On our way to the Rune Knights, Laxus finally told me about the mission. A man had found something strange in the nearby caves and was being attacked by monsters. He hired us to put the thing back and clear out the caves for him. Laxus said that the monsters must have gotten to him before we did, but I couldn't get The Arena and the poorly drawn symbol out of my head.
.^*^.
Going to the Rune Knights was a waste of time. They knew nothing and even if they did by the way they treated us they wouldn't tell us if they did. My anger over this kept festering as we searched the caves for the monsters that were supposedly attracting the client. Laxus had actually told me his plan this time. We were going to sweep through the caves front to back. I had thought of using the natural rock walls to search for creatures, but one didn't want to show off in front of Laxus and it only really worked to see if something was there. And if the monsters moved at all I would never know.
So here we are walking tensely through the caves. This was supposed to be S-Class, but we had yet to run into a monster. We had yet to run in to anything really. Laxus walked a little faster than me due to his longer legs. I watched his coat swish back and forth, my mind going numb. I robotically walked forward. I blinked. It had gotten really dark. This whole zoning out thing had become a very bad habit.
"Laxus?" I called. Silence responded. I turned in frantic circles looking for him; I had gotten hopelessly lost.
"Dam," I muttered and squatted to put my hand on the ground and muttered the spell to give me power over the earth. I closed my eyes and tried to find Laxus. I couldn't find him; something was interfering with my magic. My eyes snapped open and I looked around in fear. The air was stale and it seemed to steadily get darker in the tunnel. I turned to go back the way I had come, but I couldn't remember which way I had been going. I chose a direction and started walking. I was still scared and every step I took was faster than the last. Sprinting down the tunnel I stumbled and fell into a dimly lit hall.
My heart still pounding I searched the hall. I furrowed my eyebrows: a hall? I was in a hall covered with decaying stacks of books. I stood and looked down the hall. It was brighter at the end and seemed to open up into a larger room. At the other end the path was blocked by an ancient rock slide. I walked down the hall towards the light. That sounded really bad, even in my own head. As I got closer to the opening at the end of the hall I passed a shelf with one still intact book. The title seemed vaguely familiar: How to Be a Master Swordsman.
The moment I saw the book I heard a voice whisper, "Go back! Do not come any closer." I jumped. I couldn't help it, I was scared already and then this disembodied voice starts warning me to go away. I wanted to leave, but this seemed to be the only exit. I couldn't go back the way I came, I could swear something was swirling in the darkness.
Nothing happened when I entered the chamber. There were more broken bookshelves and papers strewn around. In one corner there was a pedestal with a closed book resting on top.
"Don't open that book!" the voice from before came back and shouted the closer I got to the book. I had no intention of opening the strange thing. I looked at the cover; it read The Complete Works of Philipth Morly. That sounded strangely familiar too.
"Wait," I spoke aloud to myself, "This was the book in the mission that Hadwin was going on? Yeah he was really excited because there was a cursed book involved... Cursed book?"
Suddenly I heard a crash behind me. I whipped around and stumbled on a decaying paper. I fell onto the pedestal and the book and I fit the floor. I looked up to see shapes forming in the darkness. Glancing back at the book I was mesmerized by the glowing lights now surrounding it
"I TOLD YOU NOT TO OPEN THAT BOOK!" the voice thundered. And with that I was sucked into the book.
~.'Laxus'.~
God Dammit! We had gotten separated. I cursed again and sniffed the air, searching for her. It really shouldn't have been hard to find her; she smelled like freshness and the breeze after a lite rain. Compared with the cramped, damp, and decaying smell of the cave it should have been easy to find her. But no I had to back track to find her. Come to think of it I haven't smelled anything in this cave. There were supposed to be monsters in this cave, but I only smelled regular cave smell: stale air and decay.
"I TOLD YOU NOT TO OPEN THAT BOOK!" suddenly echoed down the tunnels. I scrambled to pinpoint the sound. Sound like that meant people, and that meant someone who wasn't supposed to be there. I would have no trouble finding Aiyana after finding the source of the voice; she was do doubt in the thick of it. I took off down the tunnels.
As I came closer to where the sound came from, I noticed that there was an increasing amount of books scattered around the floor. How did a mission to destroy monsters (and find an informant) become a scene from a B-movie set in a library?
"What the Hell!?" I uttered. She wasn't in the room, and there was no other exit; why did I agree to this again? I walked further into the room. She had definitely been here; her sent, though quickly fading, lingered on some of the books. The fading explained why I couldn't find her, but not where she was.
Her scent was strongest on a book sitting on a pedestal in a corner of the room. Odd, I thought to myself, what's so special about that book. I walked over and opened the book.
"NNOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooo!" bawled the disembodied voice.
AN: I've never truly been satisfied with this part. I think this is the closest to what I want it to be.
I want to give a special shout out to all the people who favorited and/or fallowed this story. Thank you all so much!
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Thank you all so much for making the transition easier for me!